High-tech dog tags reunite pets with owner

Saturday

Jul 26, 2008 at 12:01 AM

Thanks to some technology and some dogged detective work, a family has been reunited. Ray DeFluri was out walking his three Jack Russell terriers, Sergeant, Lady and Shannon near his Marshalls Creek vacation home on July 11, when Lady picked up a scent and took off running.

KEITH R. STEVENSON

Thanks to some technology and some dogged detective work, a family has been reunited.

Ray DeFluri was out walking his three Jack Russell terriers, Sergeant, Lady and Shannon near his Marshalls Creek vacation home on July 11, when Lady picked up a scent and took off running. Shannon followed close behind. Despite calling to them they did not return.

DeFluri enlisted the help of his brothers, Maurice and David DeFluri, who live nearby to try to track down the dogs. The three searched for two days with no luck.

DeFluri gave up hope of ever seeing his dogs again. "I knew that there were coyotes out there, and I just hoped that someone found them and would give them a good home."

Reluctantly he returned to his Linden, N.J., home where he spoke to his vet about the loss and the fact that the older dog had an RFID, or radio-frequency identification chip, implanted in it, hoping that this could somehow help find the dogs.

His vet explained that the chips were "not like LoJack" and that the animals couldn't really be tracked that way. Little did he know that the duo had been brought to the Stroudsburg branch of the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, where they were scanned and Lady's RFID chip was detected.

RFID chip implants have become fairly common explained Barbara Marinelli of the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PSPCA). According to Marinelli, it takes only a second to insert the rice-sized implants under the skin of a dog which can then be read by a hand-held reader when placed near the animal. It gives an identification number which can be used to obtain information about the dog's owners — if it's registered with the company, that is.

In this case, that step got missed and all that Avid, the company that manufactured the chip, could provide was the distributor's name and the lot number for the implant.

This is where Marinelli rolled up her sleeves and started digging. She called the chip distributor and gave them the lot number from the manufacturer. They were able to give her the name of the pet supply warehouse which purchased that lot.

She called the pet supply warehouse, which was able to give her the name of the breeder who bought the chips. She then contacted the breeder who could only tell her the name of the pet store that the dog was sold to. The pet store in Woodbridge, N.J., was able to give the last name and address of the owner.

Marinelli could now see the end of her search but there was still one hitch: She couldn't find a phone number for the name listed.

Information came up blank and so did the Internet. Luckily, she noticed a reverse address look-up option on whitepages.com. She entered the address, which gave her the name.

It turns out that there was a misspelling of DeFluri's name somewhere along the line and that's why she couldn't find his listing.

One week had passed since the dogs went missing and thanks to Marinelli's detective work, they were handed off to DeFluri's brothers and eventually taken back home.

DeFluri said that he was really appreciative of all of the work that the PSPCA went through to get his pets back to him. He also assured that he will give them a good donation for their efforts in returning his dogs.

The youngest dog, Shannon, did not have a chip inserted at the time she was lost, but DeFluri said that after seeing how effective the chip was in returning his dogs to him he already had an appointment with his vet to have one inserted.